The art of Jun Kaneko

Japanese artist Jun Kaneko, based in Omaha, has been re-writing the rules on the size and shape of ceramic art, with his giant, fanciful ceramic sculptures. He is also helping turn the Nebraska city into a magnet for other artists.

By CBSNews.com senior producer David Morgan

Credit: Courtesy Jun Kaneko

"Rhythm" (2009), a public art installation by Jun Kaneko in Council Bluffs, Iowa. The 16 sculptures are comprised of hand-built glazed ceramic, patinated bronze, stainless steel and granite.

Credit: Courtesy Jun Kaneko

Jun Kaneko was born in Nagoya, Japan, in the months after Pearl Harbor. He showed promise early, and at 21 he was sent to America to study painting.

His host family, it turned out, collected ceramic art, and Kaneko's focus soon shifted from two dimensions to three.

Credit: Courtesy Jun Kaneko

Jun Kaneko's MFA thesis exhibition in 1971, at the Claremont Graduate School in California.

Having studied with artists who were part of what became known as the Contemporary Ceramics Movement, Kaneko later taught at Scripps College in Claremont, Calif., the Rhode Island School of Design, and the Cranbrook Academy of Art in Bloomfield, Mich.

Credit: Courtesy Jun Kaneko

Jun Kaneko at his studio at Scripps College in 1974.

Credit: Courtesy Jun Kaneko

Jun Kaneko settled in Nebraska, where his wife, Ree, runs an artist-in-residence program across the street from his studio - a 400,000-sq. ft. complex stretching across downtown Omaha.

Left: Kaneko at his Omaha studio in 1994.

Credit: Courtesy Jun Kaneko

Kaneko's breakout works were called dangos - Japanese for "dumplings" - that resemble huge closed vases.

Left: Kaneko glazes a giant ceramic dango sculpture, 2000.

Credit: Courtesy Jun Kaneko

A dango from 1998 by Jun Kaneko.

Credit: Courtesy Jun Kaneko

But his goal isn't just to make big pieces per se.

"That's true," he told CBS News' Mo Rocca. "It takes so much effort to make a big piece, so you better make sure the piece is going to be good. So don't make ugly, big piece!"

Credit: CBS News

Jun Kaneko creating his first large dangos in 1983.

Credit: Courtesy Jun Kaneko

An untitled dango from 2000. (72h x 28w x 17d in.)

Credit: Dirk Bakker/Courtesy Jun Kaneko

A dango by Jun Kaneko, 1996.

Credit: Courtesy Jun Kaneko

A dango by June Kaneko, 2000.

Credit: Courtesy Jun Kaneko

A ceramic dango by Jun Kaneko, 1998.

Credit: Courtesy Jun Kaneko

As Kaneko's work became better known, he moved on to other forms - like six-foot-tall heads.

Credit: CBS News

Jun Kaneko glazes one of his giant head ceramic sculptures, 2007.

Credit: Courtesy Jun Kaneko

One of Kaneko's giant heads, from 2004. (78h x 63w x 70d in.)

Credit: Dirk Bakker/Courtesy Jun Kaneko

Jun Kaneko with giant heads to be fired as part of the Mission Clay Pittsburg Project, 2007.